Ornette Coleman: The Shape of Jazz to Come

1959's landscape-shifting "The Shape of Jazz to Come" is true to its title. Switching from tenor to alto sax, Coleman creates free jazz, a language where chords structures are absent and harmony gives way to improvisational whims. Ranked by Rolling Stone in the top 250 Greatest Albums of All Time, the Atlantic set finds Coleman collaborating with Don Cherry, Charlie Haden, and Billy Higgins in making a masterful work free of any identifiable chord structures. Nonetheless, melodies remain, as do engrossing repetitions of main themes.

Ornette Coleman's Atlantic debut, The Shape of Jazz to Come, was a watershed event in the genesis of avant-garde jazz, profoundly steering its future course and throwing down a gauntlet that some still haven't come to grips with. The record shattered traditional concepts of harmony in jazz, getting rid of not only the piano player but the whole idea of concretely outlined chord changes.

This album belongs to a time when jazz record executives slapped broad boasts and proclamations onto their products.

Ornette Coleman's Atlantic debut, The Shape of Jazz to Come, was a watershed event in the genesis of avant-garde jazz, profoundly steering its future course and throwing down a gauntlet that some still haven't come to grips with. The record shattered traditional concepts of harmony in jazz, getting rid of not only the piano player but the whole idea of concretely outlined chord changes.

Miles Davis had publicly called him a madman. Leonard Bernstein found him, for his part, completely awesome. Few were those that didn’t have a definitive opinion on Ornette Coleman. Some kind of outlaw who preferred playing his own compositions rather than jazz classics, the American saxophonist also developed harmolodics, a theory uniting harmonics and melody. This box of ten discs compiles one of the most important era in the career of his author. Between 1959 and 1961, he released six studio albums for the Atlantic label. Six albums that are present here and spiced up with alternative takes and various bonuses, all of this of course impeccably remastered by John Webber. Albums included: The Shape Of Jazz To Come (1959), Change Of The Century (1959), This Is Our Music (1960), Free Jazz: A Collective Improvisation (1960), Ornette! (1961) and Ornette On Tenor (1961), and the compilations The Art Of Improvisers (1970), Twins (1971), To Whom Who Keeps A Record (1975) and The Ornette Coleman Legacy (1993).

In 2023, under the artistic direction of Daniel Yvinec and the arrangements by pianist Laurent Courthaliac, Pierrick Pédron ventured into a memorable project alongside the renowned Cuban pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba. Building on the success of that collaboration, Yvinec and Courthaliac have now embarked on an even more ambitious and challenging project, inviting Pédron to reinterpret one of the most iconic albums of free jazz: Ornette Coleman’s The Shape of Jazz to Come, originally recorded in 1959.
Leading his established quartet—which includes bassist Thomas Bramerie, and two of France’s most promising young jazz talents, pianist Carl-Henri Morisset and drummer Elie Martin-Charrière—Pédron skillfully navigates the intricate demands of this historical piece. Guided by the insightful and scholarly framework set by his two “producers,” he deftly avoids the pitfalls of overly reverent or purely formalistic approaches, instead bringing an organic, poetic depth to the project.

In 2023, under the artistic direction of Daniel Yvinec and the arrangements by pianist Laurent Courthaliac, Pierrick Pédron ventured into a memorable project alongside the renowned Cuban pianist Gonzalo Rubalcaba. Building on the success of that collaboration, Yvinec and Courthaliac have now embarked on an even more ambitious and challenging project, inviting Pédron to reinterpret one of the most iconic albums of free jazz: Ornette Coleman’s The Shape of Jazz to Come, originally recorded in 1959.
Leading his established quartet—which includes bassist Thomas Bramerie, and two of France’s most promising young jazz talents, pianist Carl-Henri Morisset and drummer Elie Martin-Charrière—Pédron skillfully navigates the intricate demands of this historical piece. Guided by the insightful and scholarly framework set by his two “producers,” he deftly avoids the pitfalls of overly reverent or purely formalistic approaches, instead bringing an organic, poetic depth to the project.

zeitkratzer goes Jazz! zeitkratzer is as always good for a surprise and finally goes Jazz! Looking at the line-up of the “modern composition supergroup” (The Wire) it seems astonishing that it took so long. Saxophonists Frank Gratkowski and Hayden Chisholm both won independently the German Radio SWR Jazz award; the French horn virtuoso Hild Sofie Tafjord grew up with Jazz, as her father and uncle are members of the famous Norwegian jazz group Brazz Brothers…

zeitkratzer is as always good for a surprise and finally goes Jazz! Looking at the line-up of the “modern composition supergroup” (The Wire) it seems astonishing that it took so long. Saxophonists Frank Gratkowski and Hayden Chisholm both won independently the German Radio SWR Jazz award; the French horn virtuoso Hild Sofie Tafjord grew up with Jazz, as her father and uncle are members of the famous Norwegian jazz group Brazz Brothers; Hilary Jeffery toured with numerous jazz musicians, as did the drummer Maurice de Martin who spent his early years in the New York downtown scene; Reinhold Friedl studied piano with Alexander von Schlippenbach, and Ulrich Phillipp is a known improviser who toured with Charles Gayle… and zeitkratzer is joined by a second bass player: Martin Heinze, member of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra.